Life, Priorities and Time
by krissy90210
Summary: A case turns personal and it's a race against time with no knowledge on how to win. A semi-sequel to my previous fic, Trust, Loyalty and Love. Callen/Kensi. R&R!
1. Chapter 1

**_Hi again people! This is my [semi]sequel to my last fic Trust, Love and Loyalty. It's a semi sequel because you don't really need to read that to understand this fic but if you have read it, then yay :D_**

* * *

She had woken that morning to her cell ringing to tell her that they had another case. She hated those calls not only because she had to lose some much needed sleep but because they usually included something important and dire. But this time she was kind of glad to have something to do instead of sleep and then lazily get up for normal work which she found too hard to do these days. Usually she never had to answer the phone because Callen always got there before she could even wake up to locate the phone. But now she was all alone and just remembering that made her want to get out of her comfy but cold bed to do something other than think.

She reached Ops an hour after the call and just as Sam pulled up. She was surprised to see Deeks' car already there but waited for her husband's partner, who was now their team leader in his absence, to get out of the car and meet her by the door.

"Good morning." he said and handed her a cup of coffee that she did need. She wasn't sure where he had gotten the coffee from at 6am but didn't ask him because she liked it. She had noticed that he had began to do little things for her and look out for her more since Callen had left and though it was sweet, she didn't like it but knew that saying something wouldn't do anything either.

She took the drink and they began walking in. "Morning and thanks." she replied and began drinking it. "Any idea what this case is about that got me out of bed at 5am?"

Sam shook his head and drank his own coffee. "Nope." he replied and shrugged. "Could be anything."

Kensi sighed. "Great." she said and he looked over at her with concern.

"You ok, Kenz?" he asked her in his typical protective big brother way.

"Yeah I'm fine." she said with a smile that she hoped would fool him.

He knew her smile was fake but didn't say anything about it. "You heard from G recently?" he asked knowing that was the source of her problem.

"Not since that time 2 weeks ago." she replied with a shrug she didnt mean. It did effect her more than she let on. It wasn't the first time he had gone on a long undercover mission since they had gotten married or gotten together but it didn't mean it effected her any less. "You?"

Sam shook his head and smiled. "Why would he call me when he could call you instead?" he asked and she smiled at his sweet but teasing words.

"Do we even know if he's still in LA?" Kensi asked and although she was concerned for him, she was more interested in the case because the more they knew about it, the more they might be able to help and the faster she could have him home.

He shrugged and then smiled brightly. "Probably. We'd have heard about it if he was elsewhere. The other agencies wouldn't know what to do with him." he laughed and she laughed too at his joke even though she knew there was a little bit of truth in there. "He'll be fine. It's not his first undercover op or the longest or even the furthest away."

Kensi sighed knowing that he spoke the truth and it gave her a bit of comfort. "I know. I just-" she said but Sam cut her off with a smirk.

"Miss him? Worry about him? Want him back?" he teased again and she hit him gently on the arm.

"I was going to say that I just don't want it to end like last time and he had cut off ties with us then." she said and he knew that by 'last time' she referred to the time he was gunned down even after finishing the undercover op.

"That was because he was too stubborn to get in touch and let us know he was ok until he needed something or Eric caught him on camera." Sam replied, trying to break the tense and serious conversation into something lighter. "He'll get in touch whenever he can now and we all know that it's towards the end of a long undercover op that you go without contact to the outside world."

"So not to get caught at the last step and everything that you've worked at doesn't go to waste. I know." Kensi said and sighed before shaking her head and smiling. "Never mind. He has something to do and so do we." she said when they reached Eric's op room and he nodded and took her words as a sign to end the conversation but he made it a point to remember it just in case he needed to later because despite her words, she didn't seem as normal as she wanted them to believe.

* * *

She opened the door to the car to step out into the hot summer sun less than an hour later with the rest of the team, that was currently only Deeks and Sam. There had been a murder of a Petty Officer close by the broadwalk and they had been put onto the case because it was naval related and in their area. There was a small crowd around the taped off area but that was to expected when a crime occured in a public and popular area even if it was early in the morning. Luckily, the body had been covered by the coroner and the forensics.

She took a look around the area to see what was going on and who was there before joining the other two where they had been talking to the coroner. "What she say?" Kensi asked them.

Sam was the first to answer. "She's been dead a while and died instantly appearently. Shot through the head." he told her and she frowned a bit at the gruesome scene.

"How long has she been missing for?" she asked and Deeks replied this time.

"A few days. They kept her body after killing her and then decided to dump her today for some reason." he shrugged and the other two took in the scene once again.

Sam was the first to turn away and get to the job and she followed by looking around the scene for anything odd. It was hard to do when the scene was outside but they had no choice. She had gotten to the outskirts of the scene when she felt her cell phone vibrate in her pocket so she took it out and was surprised to see it was an unidentified number. Kensi knew who it probably was and was glad that she was away from the crowds and other people as she as answered it.

"Hello?" she said because even though she thought she knew who it might be, if she was wrong then she couldn't take the chance of letting anyone else know who she was just in case.

"Babe, I can't talk long but I have some info you might need." Callen said and she let out a breath of relief that she didn't know she was holding back when she heard his voice. She knew that him calling her was very risky and that if he got caught, it could lead to some serious consequences, which was why he avoided using her name in case he was overheard so they wouldn't know who she was. "You on the case on the broadwalk yet?" he asked her before she could say anything else.

Kensi frowned at his words. "Yeah. How did you know about that?" she asked him and she could hear the smirk as she spoke.

"Contacts." he told her in his smug way that relaxed her more because it meant that things were going ok on his side undercover in a small gang. "Listen, I dunno the guy responsible but he seems to be known around here as someone who takes people to get something and kills them if he doesn't get it."

"Like a ransom?" she asked carefully.

"Yeah, sort of, though it's hardly ever money. But noone's seen his face or knows his name because he doesn't really contact the people after he's kidnapped them. Just the once to say that he had them," Callen told her and she frowned in confusion.

"I don't get it. Why doesn't he-?" she began but he cut her off and she remembered that he didn't have long to talk freely to her and she knew that if he got caught then he would be in serious trouble.

"I dunno, sweetheart, but I do know that there's more bodies that he hadn't gotten rid of yet. He stores them in a warehouse somewhere." he told her and there was a pause and she could guess he was checking to make sure he wasn't being heard. "I have a few names of the victims." he gave her 3 names and she stored them in her mind. "Ok?"

She nodded even though he couldn't see. "I'll get Eric to check it out." she told him before dropping her voice again. "How are you? Is everything going ok?"

"I'm fine and it's all going good." he said simply and she knew that there wasn't much more he could add to it. "Everything good there?"

"Perfect." she told him and it wasn't much of a lie if she thought about it compared to where he was. The only lie was that it wasn't perfect because he wasn't there but she couldn't give him that guilt to carry. "See you soon?" she asked hopefully.

Callen laughed lightly and spoke. "Maybe a week." he told her and she knew that it was a cautious answer that it was going to be soon. "I've got to go, it's been too long already. I'll try to call again soon if I get the chance."

"Ok." she said and there was another pause and she knew that he was fighting to something else but knew that he couldn't risk it. "I know, G. You too."

He sighed and she smiled a bit. "Good. Bye." he quickly hung up and she guessed that someone had neared him or he had been gone for too long already so didn't take it personally. The fact that she got to talk to him was enough for then.

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**_This is my first ever sequel to anything so please let me know what you think! I am a bit worried because this is a bit more case-based BUT I assure you that it's got more to do with Callen/Kensi than anything else. There aren't enough fics with them out there so I just had to add to the ones that are._**


	2. Chapter 2

Kensi had informed the others with what she had been told and she wasn't surprised when they didn't question her words when she told them her source or when they didn't ask anything else about it because they knew the phone call was a more private matter. Sam had been the only one to ask her if Callen had been ok and she had simply smiled and told him that he was and that he sounded more optimistic than before, something that they both were happy about.

When they had gotten back to the Ops center, they went straight up to Eric's tech room when he had whistled for them almost immedately. They hadn't even gotten the chance to sit or unholster their guns before they were walking up the stairs to the main room where they did most of their work. After she had hung up on Callen, she had immediately phoned Eric so that he could run a search for the names that he had given her. Now, they all stood around the middle table to look at the screen on the wall where Eric had put up the information on the victims.

"The 3 victims had nothing much in common except that they weren't reported missing until a few days later because the person who had taken them hadn't gotten back in touch." Eric explained and the others nodded at the fact that it fit in with what Callen had said. "All look different, all had different jobs and all were of different age. Only thing that is almost similiar is where they live which is the same area but nowhere where they'd run into each other frequently."

"Random killings then." Deeks said. "Because the murder from this morning doesn't fit it either except that the MO was the same."

"Have you searched anything gang related? Maybe with close friends or family?" Kensi asked Eric when she remembered that the only way that Callen would have found out about the kidnapping and murders is if it had to do with some people he was currently involved with and that was a gang. And gangs knew other gangs well.

Eric shook his head at her words. "Nothing came up."

"He's a ghost." Sam stated and everyone else nodded. "Wait, didn't G say he keeps them in warehouse until he wants to dump the body?"

Kensi nodded. "Is there a warehouse that's close to all 4 victims? One that's out of the main busy area and easy to miss." Eric searched as she had asked and they waited patiently for only a few moments before the results came up.

"One." Eric said as he put up a picture of the map to show them where he meant.

"It's not that far from here, actually." Deeks said too as he looked at the map and then turned to the others. "But it's in the middle of a greenary area which would keep it hidden."

"And noone would suspect it because they wouldn't know what we know." Sam added and then turned to the other two people on his team. "Let's go check it out."

* * *

They pulled up near the abandoned looking warehouse not long after and got out to check it out. Although they had no proof that this was the place they were looking for, they had taken precaution and gotten some backup and worn vests and entered slowly with their guns out as they went through the place. The enterance led them down a dim hallway that then split into a few other hallways. Sam indicated for Deeks and Kensi to go one way and he would go another with backup and the others would go the third and keeping in touch through their earphones and through Eric.

The place was very empty but at the end of the hallway that she and her partner went down, Kensi stopped as it split into two again. They made the decision to take one way each and kept in contact through the earphone constantly just in case and with Sam to let him know. There was a big room at the end of her hallway that was a bit brighter than the hallway itself and she approached it carefully so not to make a sound or to alert anyone else. When she got there, there were a few piles of carboard boxes piled up high that she hid behind when she heard other voices.

"Guys, I think I found the place." she told the others in a quiet whisper and peeked around the corner of the cardboard boxes to see two men talking to each other and she had just heard the name of another victim when she pulled out her phone so that she could record and take pictures of what was happening so she could send it to Eric or keep as proof incase they got away.

"Alright, stay where you are. I'm coming there." Sam was the first to reply and she could here him running through the earpeice.

Deeks was the same. "I'll be there in a minute." he told her and she only murmured an ok as she concentrated on both holding up her gun, holding her phone to take pictures and trying to read their lips.

"They're talking about the other victims, but in past tense. They must be dead already." Kensi told them through the ear piece. "I've got a few good shots. I'll send them to Eric-" she began to lower down her phone when she felt the familiar cold barrel placed to the back of her neck.

"Kensi?" Sam was the first to question her sudden quietness but before she could reply with anything, everything went black for her with a swift thud. She had tried to get away, but hadn't counted on another person being there to be the one to knock her out. "Kensi!"

Sam met Deeks halfway down the hallway towards the room where she had been and he knew that he had the same look of fear and worry as the LAPD detective did. Carefully but quickly, they entered the room, hoping to see more than just boxes. They looked everywhere and could see no sign of anyone being there.

"Maybe she was in another room?" Deeks suggested with hope but Sam could only shake his head.

"She was here. Look, blood." he pointed out the few drops on the floor and the smudge on a box before spotting something behind it. "I think I have her cell."

Deeks went over to him and nodded, knowing the sight of his partner's iPhone cell very well. "She did say she was taking pictures." he said and Sam tried to look at them.

"Damn, it's locked already." he sighed before calling in to Eric. "Eric, what do you have on her location?"

"Offline." he told them sadly and they all realised suddenly, now that the adrenaline rush and the moment had gone what had really happened. "She's gone, Sam. They took her."

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**_Wow, once again, I'm amazed by the response to my fic! A massive thank you to all of you who added, alerted, faved and reviewed the first chapter, such as tibbee, MadiL93, liesel, CharlieLPHJ and Sairs J. I'm sorry for the short chapter. It's because this did seem the best place to stop and I have exams for the next 5 days straight so I don't have much time to dedicate to writing right now. But I love writing and hate leaving you guys hanging for long so I'd rather post something short that I know is decent rather than something that's long and terrible! Please R&R again and lemme know what you think :D :D_**


	3. Chapter 3

They had searched the entire warehouse for over an hour and Eric had tried to find any camera footage to see if he could find out anything more on where Kensi had gone but they had all come up with nothing. The only thing that they had was her cell phone so Sam and Deeks headed back to the Ops center with the phone to give to their tech operator so that he could maybe unlock it and get the photos that Kensi had taken to give them another lead.

It hadn't taken Eric long to get past the first lock code and they were all optimistic that they would be able to get to the photos and identify the man in charge of the kidnapping pretty quickly. But once he had gotten into her cell phone items, there had been more passwords, and these were harder to crack. He knew that they wouldn't be easy because the OSP agents' phones were encrypted and protected about 50 times more than the original cell phone just in case they fell into the wrong hands. Although they didn't keep anything personal on their cell phones, things such as the pictures that Kensi had just taken would be of value and use to the bad guys in this case.

Eric himself had done most of the encryption which allowed him to get a bit further but what he hadn't done or known were the passwords that Kensi had set up herself so that noone else could get into the phone except for her. It had been him who had told her to do that just like he had told everyone else, but right then, he wished he hadn't because it wasn't going to help them.

He sighed and turned to look at where Samm, Deeks and Hetty were standing and pacing in the room. "I can't get into the pictures." he told them with another sigh and a sad look.

"Why not?" Deeks asked.

"They have a lock on them that I can't work my way through. I set up the system so that it wasn't breakable and it's working." he told them. "And I think that even if I got past this lock, there'd be more to come. I can't overwrite it." he added, knowing that it wasn't what anyone else wanted to hear.

"So what do we do?" Sam asked angry that they had not only lost one of their teamates, but that they had no way of finding her at the moment. "Without that, we have nothing."

Deeks shrugged as he spoke. "Maybe she wrote it down somewhere or told someone." he suggested and Sam looked up at him as if in a sudden realisation. "What?"

"G would know." he said and they all agreed that he was right.

"Too bad he's undercover." Deeks commented with a sigh though there was feeling inside of him that it wasn't going to stay that way for long.

Sam turned to look at Hetty as he spoke. "He'll want to know. One of us could go meet him and take Kensi's cell phone with us so that he can unlock it. We'll have our lead."

"If I know Mr Callen, and I do believe I do, then he won't take the news lightly. He'll want out of his case and be back here." she told the other man and he nodded.

"He told Kensi that he was close to closing up. A week or something. Maybe he could pull it forward." Hetty still looked a bit worried so he carried on. "We owe it to him to let him know at least, right?"

Hetty sighed and shook her head a bit. "Unfortunately, you are right there, Mr Hanna. I'll leave him a message that we need to meet with him ASAP." she said as she began to leave. "You decide which one is going to go and what you're going to say and do."

Sam nodded and turned back to the one remaining person on his team who held his hands up. "Hey, I do _not_ want to be the one to tell G Callen that we got his wife kidnapped." he said and Sam rolled his eyes. "Ok?"

"I'll go." he said in reply and he knew that he didn't want anyone else to be the one to go and tell his partner and best friend about what had happened because it was more his job, and Callen was less likely to do anything rash if he was there to reason with him like noone else could right then. Turning back to Eric he remembered what had led them to this moment right then in the first place. "Eric, what's been happening with the body from this morning?"

He turned to his computer to put up the information that he had received. "She had been dead for about 2 weeks, which was 3 days after she was taken." he told them.

"If it's the same people, then maybe Kensi will have 3 days too." Deeks pointed out before frowning. "Although, they didn't take her for a reason other than the fact that she had seen who they were and heard what they had said."

Sam shook his head. "Nah, if they didn't want anything, they would have killed her." he told him. "They know that she's NCIS and that she was on the case. Maybe they want her help with the other bodies because the last one led us straight to them."

"Good theory, especially as they haven't contacted us yet about her, and the victims' family said that they were contacted within an hour, and it's been over 2 for Kensi." Deeks added with some relief just as Hetty reentered the room.

"Mr Callen replied. Meet him at the benches by the central park in half an hour." She informed them and Sam nodded before telling the others to carry on with trying to both find Kensi and maybe getting another lead from the other cases, and then dreadingly walked out of the room to go to see his partner.

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**_Ok, wow! I cannot believe the response that I'm getting for this fic and I am overwhelmed by every single one of them! Thanks for all the adds, alerts, favs and reviews - evershort, keelzz64, Allie, SuzyloveCSIMiami, Searching4Sanity [my first constructive critisism comment. I took aboard what you said in this chapter and I hope it came across better :D And your questions shall be answered in time, though I can tell you there's going to be no Nell], Cowboy's Girl [thanks for the idea. I already have a plan set out about what happens with this fic and the characters, so keep reading to find out if you had the same idea as me!], liesel and Sairs J. I hope you enjoyed this chapter too. I'm so sorry it's short once again, but hopefully, once exam week is over, it'll get longer. Thanks for all the good luck messages. I think they worked today! Please R&R!_**


	4. Chapter 4

Sam only had to wait for 5 minutes before he was joined by his partner. They sat on different benches to face each other. The area was deserted and well covered so that noone could possibly see them just in case Callen was followed.

Sam looked at him for a moment and knew that he wasn't going to talk first so he started. "How you doing?" he asked him and Callen smirked and shrugged, resting his elbows on his knees as he did.

"Fine, Sam." he rolled his eyes typically. "Undercover and still trying to mother me." he said and Sam smiled tightly.

"Just making sure." he said, not sure how to get onto the subject but he didn't have to because Callen noticed his tight smile and sat up a bit straighter and seriously.

"What's going on?" he asked. "Hetty said it was urgent."

Sam nodded and cleared his throat before pulling out the cell phone from his pocket and just held it. "Unlock this." he told him and Callen raised his eyebrows at him. "Please?"

Callen shook his head but accepted the item anyway but didn't do what he was asked to. "What's this got to do with?" he asked but when Sam stayed silent, he turned the cell phone around in his hands and realised that he recognised the small dents and scratches on it. "This is Kensi's."

"Yeah." Sam nodded and Callen typed something in to unlock it anyway but didn't go any further than the main screen. "We need to get into the pictures."

"Not until you tell me why she couldn't do this herself." he said and Sam could hear both the worry and anger in his words.

Sam sighed and nodded. "The case from this morning, the one you informed us on, well, we found the warehouse you said and we went to check it out." he told him and he could tell that Callen knew what was coming up by his fixed jaw and hardered eyes but he didn't say anything so he carried on. "Kensi found where they kept the bodies or something, but she saw the people in charge and took pictures for proof, but before any of us could reach her, she was gone."

"Gone?" Callen asked with a raised eyebrow.

"They took her. Eric couldn't even find a trace for her." Sam shook his head.

"How long ago was this?" he asked as he looked down at the phone in his hands and did what Sam had intended him to do.

"About 3 hours now." he told him and Callen looked at him coldly before looking at the phone. "You got the pictures?"

"Yeah." he said but he went through them first and shook his head. "Do you know who he is?"

"No, do you?" Callen shook his head and sent the pictures to Eric like he knew that Sam would do later on. "We'll see if he's in the system."

Callen shook his head again and finished sending all the pictures and locked the phone to just hold it. "He won't be." he said and then looked around. "Ok, tell Hetty that there's going to be a meeting at the main base for almost all the gang tonight at 6. Get a team together and crash it." he told him and Sam shook his head in confusion when he started to talk about his undercover job all of a sudden.

"Wait, I though you said another week." he said.

Callen shook his head again. "That was before Kensi went missing." he told him. "I want out _now_."

"We'll get her back. You can't break out of your character now. You'll put yourself at risk if it doesn't go right." Sam told him and Callen nodded.

"It'll work." he said with confidence. "It has to be tonight, alright? And if Hetty disagrees, then I'll do it myself. Either way, I'm out of here by tonight."

Sam knew that this would be his response but it wasn't something that he knew how to reply to. Telling Callen what to do wasn't a choice because when it came to something as big and personal like this, he wouldn't listen to anyone. "You're not going to help anyone by getting yourself killed."

"I can't keep in character anymore, Sam. It's gonna be hard to not break it until 6 because until I'm out of here, all I'm going to think about if whether or not she's still alive and how the search is going. That'll get me killed faster. You got it?" Callen told him strictly and Sam understood.

A thought from earlier that day came back to his mind, something that he had intended to ask either his partner or Kensi but never had the chance to until then. "The info that you passed on to Kensi, how did you get it?" he asked him.

"One of the guys heard some stuff from some people he knew." Callen shrugged. "It wasn't much though. He tried to get in with them but they're pretty exclusive."

"Maybe he knows more than he let on." he suggested but Callen brushed it off quickly.

"He doesn't." he sighed fraustratedly. "He's just kid looking to make an easy million. He picked up the goss from some others and tried to find a way in."

Sam nodded but wasn't totally convinced. "He might have been lying. Who turned him down?" he asked and Callen looked up at him, trying to recall the conversaion.

"He didn't give me a name. I'll see if he'll give me a description." he told him. "And he wasn't lying."

"You've only been in there for a little while compared to the others. How do you know they trust you enough to tell you everything? Maybe they're involved too." Sam said and Callen frowned angrily.

"Sam, if they knew _anything_ then _I _would know too. My cover has a rep that's been around for longer than some of their's." he told him seriously. "They're not involved and they trust me enough. What else? Has he got in touch with you yet?" he asked, changing the subject.

"No. We don't think he wants anything but just took her because she found him out. Maybe to help them cover their tracks for next time." he stated and Callen nodded.

"Makes sense. Means she has more time." he said.

"The victim from this morning died after 3 days and Kensi said that she heard them talk about the others in past tense." Sam told him and Callen took in the information.

"So she's safe until the next body dump. Then if that works, they might not need her anymore." he said and Sam hated to agree. "Dammit." he muttered angrily as he thought about everything that he had just been told.

"We'll get her back. She's strong too, so she won't give in. She'll know that we're looking for her and we won't stop until we find her." Sam told him reassuringly and Callen nodded and handed Kensi's phone back over to his partner. "I'll let Hetty know what you said and she'll get in touch with what she says. If she doesn't agree, send me a message and I'll help you get out."

"You focus on finding Kensi. I'll get myself out. She's top priority right now, alright?" he said forcefully and Sam sighed and nodded and Callen nodded back before standing up. "Let me know if you find out anything else."

Sam didn't say anything but nodded as his partner left carefully, looking around just in case out of practice and waited a few more minutes before leaving himself. The conversation was one that he never wanted to have but now that it was done, he was glad it went smoother than he thought it would and at least they had a lead now.

* * *

_**Sorry for the delayed update. I've had 2 exams today and have another 2 tomorrow, so I'm sorry for the short chapter too. Hopefully, I'll be able to post a longer one tomorrow. Thank you all for the encouragements and the reviews. I cannot believe the response I'm getting for this fic! It overwhelms me :D Thanks to all of you who have read, added, faved and especially - montydam, MadL93, tibbee, evershort [yep, there'll be a chapter from Kensi's POV after the next, I think], Allie [yeah, I like the brother/sister relationship between Sam and Kensi too but I hate that they avoid much interaction with the two of them in the show], TWHATT18, Peonywinx, Cowboy's Girl and Kensi14. Please enjoy and R&R this chapter too guys!**_


	5. Chapter 5

Sam had informed Hetty about Callen's request and although she hadn't been happy with it or use to being told what to do, she knew that she was practically backed into a corner. When he said that he would get out that evening with or without their help, she knew that the only thing that she had the power to do was to make sure that he didn't get himself killed or let the case that he had worked on for over a month now go south. So she gathered a team and sent them to where Callen had requested, keeping in touch with them via Eric's technical room as well as keeping up to date with finding Kensi.

The pictures that Kensi had taken before being kidnapped were of good quality and allowed Eric to run them through the databases for identification. There were 4 different men in the pictures but only one of them was in the system for petty theft and assult. His name was Chris Morgan and because he had just gotten out of jail, they had an address for him. It wasn't too late in the day, although it wasn't early either, so they weren't sure whether he would be home or not. Deciding to go along with the only lead that they had, Sam and Deeks went to the home of Morgan in hopes of finding him.

By the time 7o'clock came around, Hetty was back in her office waiting for the arrival of her senior agent. The bust had gone well, capturing most of the members of the gang with only two fatalities and Callen had gotten out of there as soon as he could so that noone could say that it was him who had set them up. Now, she waited for him to come in because she had instructed him to as soon as he had called her asking what was going on with Kensi's case. She could have told him about their only lead but she wanted to wait until she saw him and could tell him face to face because otherwise, there was no doubt in her mind that he would go straight to Morgan's place without a care for any regulations.

When she saw him, she got up from behind her desk and walked over towards the main part of the hidden base in a calm manner. She was only calm on the outside though, especially as she saw the agitation and anger and worry written all over Callen's face and actions as he hurriedly entered the place.

"Mr Callen. Nice to see you back again, fit and well, although I wish it were under different citcumstances." she said and he stopped short. Anyone else, he would have ignored them and gone straight up to be filled in with what he could but not with Hetty.

He crossed his arms. "Don't we all." he said before looking up towards the balcony of the upper floor. "How far have we gotten on the case? Have we found who those people in the photos were?"

"Sam and Deeks have gone after the one that we were able to ID." Hetty informed him with the rarity of using her agents' first names or dropping the titles, but he guessed that it was a high stressed situation and everyone was going to be acting different than normal. "They should be back soon. Why don't we go see if they've checked in with Mr Beale?" she said, reverting back to her professional mode.

Callen had no choice or time to do anything but follow her up the stairs. He knew that pressing the matter with Hetty would get him nowhere as opposed to anyone else in that building. The only way he was going to get any information on anything was to follow her to the Ops center where he hoped they would explain it to him and get him up to date.

Eric was still in his seat in the technical room, typing away on his keyboard as Callen guessed he searched something for whatever Sam or Deeks was asking him to over the earpeice currently in his ear. When he saw them enter, he paused a bit before carrying on when he realised that he hadn't replied to the person on the other side of the call.

"I'm sending you the address now." he told them before pulling out his earpeice and putting the phone on speaker so that everyone could hear. He turned to look at Hetty and Callen once he had sent it and they had confirmed they had received it before hanging up. "Sam and Deeks went to Morgan's place but he wasn't there. Neighbor said he might be at some club so I sent them the address." he explained.

Hetty nodded but Callen had questions. "Who's Morgan?" he asked and Eric forgot all about the welcoming back formalities and went straight to the case at hand.

"He was the only one we could identify from the photos Kensi took." he told him as he put the information back up onto the screen so that the agent could see.

Callen nodded as he read the information. "Let me see the pictures again." he told him. After he had met with Sam and before the bust, he had managed to talk to the kid who had informed him about the kidnapping to get a better description of the guy he had spoken to about it. He hadn't known a name but once Callen had told him that he thought it might be a good business to go into, the kid had readily told him the best description he could considering he had met him at night in some alleyway. "Here, clear this up for me." he ordered Eric as he spotted one photo with a good shot of a person who matched the description.

"And who is that, exactly?" Hetty asked him carefully.

Callen didn't turn to face her as he spoke. "He's the one who spoke to my contact about what was going on. He's not smart and I know exactly where he'll be in about," he paused to look at his watch. It was already 7.30pm and that meant that Kensi had been missing for near to 8 hours now. The thought of it made his insides churn but he pushed it away so he could focus on his job to get her back home again. "In about 2 hours."

"And where's that?" she asked him as Eric finished doing his job and put up the new image that Callen quickly zoomed in to.

"An alleyway off of 21st." he told her. "Can you get any hits off this?" he asked Eric who shook his head.

"Nothing." he said apologetically and he nodded.

"Never mind. I'll go meet with him." he said coolly before changing the subject. "Where are Sam and Deeks with Morgan?" he asked Eric who turned to look at his screen quickly before turning back.

"They haven't said reported anything yet, so they probably haven't gotten to the club yet." he told him. "It was a little bit away from the house."

Callen nodded impatiently. "What else?" he asked and when noone answered, he frowned and crossed his arms. "That's it? What about the dead PO from this morning?"

"Nothing substantial came back from that. And we cross referenced it with the other victims but without their bodies, there's nothing else to be found." Eric informed him

"There's always something to be found if we look hard enough!" Callen snapped to noone in particular only for Hetty cut him off before he could add anything more to it.

"Mr Callen. We are doing the best that we can with what we have." she told him but it did nothing to ease his mind or soften his mood. "I suggest that you take time to cool off and perhaps clean up before we go any further." she said, eyeing the few scratches on his temple and arm from when he had escaped from the gang at the bust.

Callen shook his head. "I don't have time for that." he told her in a more quieter voice but he anger, worry and a bit of fear was still there. She knew that a personal case was bad enough for anyone on the team to handle, but this was 10 times worse for him. The only thing she could rely on was the fact that Callen was the best agent that she had ever known and he would be able to get the job done with keeping his emotions in check at times of need. "I have to meet with _him_ soon."

"In a couple of hours. Mr Hanna and Deeks should be back by then and we can converge our theories and get everyone up to date before that. But until then, there's nothing to do but to get yourself cleaned up and a bit more presentable for the meet." she told him and he hated it but he knew that she was right. Even though the man he would meet would be no good, he could go looking like he had just escaped a fight. He had to look more able and skilled and _smart_.

Callen turned to Eric as he began to leave. "You let me know the _second_ anything happens, yeah?" he said and Eric nodded, not needing to have been told that.

* * *

It was an hour later when Sam and Deeks had returned to the headquarters. They had called in when they had found Chris Morgan but unfortunately they had been too late and hadn't had the chance to speak to him as he had already been dead a little while by the time they caught up to him. LAPD had been informed and they had stuck around to gather as much info as they could but eventually handed the case over by telling them they wanted to know everything that they found out about him before heading back.

Now, they were all gathered in the bullpen area of the building, trying to work out what to do with their main lead gone. The presence of their team leader hadn't been anything momentous past a few greetings because of the dire situation but they had had time to fill him in with everything else before moving back onto Morgan.

"Single shot to the head so it was someone who knew what they were doing." Deeks explained after getting off the phone with his collegues at LAPD about the cause of death. "They don't have much else though." he said and the others weren't too surprised with the way the case was currently going.

"So that's one out of the 4 down." Sam stated and crossed out the picture of Chris Morgan from the stills on the TV screen that showed them the remaining three memebers of the group that had kidnapped Kensi.

Callen stared at the screen as they all fell into a silence. There wasn't much else to say or do because they really had nothing else to go on. He sighed and turned away to go to his desk to get his gun and car keys.

The others watched him but only Sam spoke up. "Hey, where are you going?" he asked, moving towards him but Callen didn't bother to glance up.

"To meet with the other one." he said.

Sam look at his watched. "You still have another half hour." he said and Callen looked at him and shrugged.

"Beats waiting here, doing nothing." he said and began walking away. "Keep digging and let me know if you find anything." he told them while leaving. He heard the footsteps before he saaw his partner fall into step next to him. "What?"

"I'm coming with you." Sam said. Callen gave him a questioning look that made him carry on. "You'll need back up in case he's not on his own."

Callen sighed, not in the mood for fighting right then. "Fine." he said, making his way to his car and getting into the driver's seat. "But I do the talking, alright?"

Sam nodded but didn't say a word. He'd let him do the talking at first but if things got out of hand, he'd take over.

* * *

**_Sorry in the delay in updating. Had a very busy day yesterday and today, but here's the next chapter! Thanks again to all of you who have read this fic, especially to keelzz64, evershort, Cowboy's Girl, MadiL93 and .grace for the reviews. Please R&R and enjoy!_**


	6. Chapter 6

She wasn't entirely sure whether her eyes were open or not, even when she blinked a few times. Everything was unnaturally black. Kensi realised that she was laying on something, and it was rather soft. Using a hand to investigate without causing much of movement, she found out that it was a bed. She paused and closed her eyes once again, using her insticts to determine whether she was alone or not. After a few seconds, she decided that she was and pushed herself up into a sitting position.

Her head hurt as she did and as she put a hand to the back of her head, she felt the stickiness of blood in her hair from where they had hit her to knock her out. A bout of anger coursed through her at the fact that she had lost to the two men when she was very capable at defending herself. She just hadn't seen the two additional men who had put a gun to her and then knocked her out.

Knowing that it wasn't going to help matters at that moment, she looked around the darkened room that had turned to a few shades of grey as her eyes adjusted. It was a small room, like a psychiatric hospital room, with no window and nothing else but the bed that she sat on. The door wasn't too far either but it was on the other side of the room.

Her eyes stung as she kept on staring and Kensi lifted a hand when she felt liquid on her eyelashes. It was more smoother than tears and she figured that they must have put something in her eyes, but she wasn't too sure what or why. She didn't even know how long she had been out for or whether she had a concussion or not. But seeing as she had slept a bit and woken up alive, the concussion can't have been that bad.

Slowly, she moved to the edge of the bed, listening out for any signs of people around her or the room, but hearing nothing like she had predicted. Her arms ached as she used them to move herself forward but it was a dull ache and nothing but her head hurt with a sharp pain. She took it as a good sign that they hadn't killed her already. Once she sat on the edge of the bed, she thought back to what had happened. All that she could remember was taking the photos before being confronted.

Her hand quickly when to her ear where her earpiece had been but it had been removed already and she knew they would have crushed it by now. Her jeans pockets were empty, her gun was gone and she realised that someone had taken off her bulletproof vest, but she was just grateful that that was all they had taken off.

Standing up, she used a hand to balance herself as her head spun at the new motion before keeping the hand out to guide her around the room. It only took about 3 steps before she was by the door. Naturally, Kensi tried the handle even though she had known it wouldn't be open. She tried it twice, in both directions, before letting it go and looking back towards the bed. She still couldn't see much and her eyes began to strain as she used too much effort in trying so.

Suddenly, she could hear something in the odd silence; footsteps. She guessed it was because of the small sound she had made when trying the door, and she stood still next to it whilst listening to the foorsteps near before stopping outside. Keys jingled and Kensi prepared herself to either fight with the person entering or to distract them somehow to run out. The footsteps had come from the opposite direction so she knew where to go.

When the door opened, the man entered slowly as if preparing himself for her attack, but he had not been expecting it so soon as she used the door as the only weapon she had and slammed it into his face to disorient him. Before he could even get his bearings, she grabbed his arm and twisted it before kicking out his legs from under him. Kensi didn't stay to see if he had truely gone down but used the opportunity to get out of the room and run down the corridor towards the end. Her head pounded and her whole body fought against her actions but she was trained to ignore it all to get out safely.

The building was dark itself, but not so much as the room she had been it. She passed a high window to see darkness outside and realised why the building was plunged into such darkness. Making her way through the corridors, she did her best to keep an ear out for sounds of footsteps and and eye out for any doors that led out. It worried her that she had made it so far without anyone coming after her but she pushed it to the back of her mind.

That was until she reached a door that took her into a bigger room, almost like the room where she had been taken. Suddenly, she heard voices, whispering quickly and angrily and she knew that she was the cause of it. The room was too large for her to see anyone, but she knew they were in there and as she made her way around the edges, she finally realised that she could hear the whirring of computers. She guessed that they had cameras placed about, something that was confirmed when she saw one screen with the corridor that she had just come down. That was why they hadn't come after her and why they were waiting there for her.

Because they knew that she had to come there in the end.

Which meant that there was a way out from that room.

Slowly, Kensi creeped around the room, pushing back the thought that wished someone from her team was there with her or even Eric in her ear to guide her. She couldn't see well in the dim light and she had no weapon but herself to defend herself.

Sudden shouts of '_there' _and _'by the east wall'_ told her that she had been made and she did her best to get away from there, but she wasn't quick enough to outrun 3 men whilst injured and in a place she didn't know. She was stopped by a man in front of her so she went left, only to find someone else blocking her. This time, she attacked, hitting him in the neck to startle him before kneeing him in the stomach to make him double over. Kensi thought that she had made it until the sound of a gunshot echoed in the big room and she froze when the man with the gun appeared in front of her with the gun pointing straight at her.

"If you run, Agent Blye, the only that's going to chase you is a bullet." he told her and she refused to frown or scowl or show any emotion to his words when on the inside she felt fear trying to get out. She squashed it quick enough to to realise that the man who spoke sounded a lot closer than she could see him, and even then, all she could see was an outline.

"If you wanted to kill me, you'd have killed me already." she said nonetheless, squinting and trying to see him better but to no avail.

The man laughed. "Having trouble seeing, Agent?" he asked tauntingly before calling out to two other men and she recorded the names to memory. "Wilson, Taylor, turn on the lights." Kensi was grateful for the order because she thought it would give her an advantage and to take in with what she was dealing with but when the lights came on, her eyes felt as if they were on fire and she couldn't fight the natural instinct to cover them with her hands. "Better?" he asked tauntingly again.

Kensi composed herself to stand up straighter, but kept her head downwards. "What did you do?" she asked him roughly as the lights dimmed slowly when the man clicked his fingers and she realised that he was the man in charge. Opening her eyes, she glanced up but her sight was worse than before. "I can't see." she stated quietly, more to herself than him.

"I know." he told her. "It's a pupil dilator. Renders you blind in the light, and naturally in the dark." he laughed and she felt someone grab her arm. She went to attack him on instinct but the man's words warned her off. "You can fight your way through my men, but you won't get out of here until you fight through me. And seeing as you're blind and I have a gun, I think I'd win, don't you?" he asked sarcastically and she did everything she could to keep away the urge to attack anyway.

Kensi let out a long breath as she let herself be guided to where she assumed was the middle of the room. Her eyesight was going back to grey again and she could see small points of light from what she assumed were lamps from the corner of her eyes which only distorted her view more.

"I have a job for you." he told her and she could place his voice at being further away from her than before. If she couldn't see then she would have to rely on her other senses to help her out. "If you refuse, I'll kill you." he said matter of factly.

"And if I do it?" she asked plainly, not liking the grip one of the men had on her arm and she guessed it was the one she had just fought.

"I'll let you go." he said simply and she smirked. "Find that funny, Agent Blye?"

"Oh no." Kensi said sarcastically. "I always believe the words of the man holding me hostage."

He laughed at her words. "I think we're going to get on just fine. I like humor in a woman." he stated and she let the smirk die as she thought about how she would hurt him once she was out of there and had her eyesight back again. "You're not a hostage. I don't want anything from anyone else for your release. I just want your expertise."

"Which is?" she asked and she heard a rustling as something like a tarp was moved away before the unforturnately familiar smell of decomposing bodies hit her.

"I want you to help me get rid of these bodies so that noone will ever know it was me." he said and she shook her head.

"I'm not a forensic scientist. I can't do that." she said even though she was lying and she was certain he knew that.

He let out a breath and she could tell that he had prepared for this conversation but was rather bored too. "You work on scenes and you investigate. I need you to tell me what to do so that noone will know to come after me. I know you can do it, and you will."

"Or you'll kill me?" she asked rhetorically in hope to but some time.

"Yes." he said slowly. "But first I'll start with your teammates. Agent Sam Hanna and Detective Marty Deeks. Correct?" he asked and she refused to give him the joy of an answer. "Or should I start with the innocent technican, Eric Beale?" he asked her and she felt herslf stiffen at that. She knew that Sam and Deeks could look after themself, but Eric could bare touch a gun or punch something without hurting himself more. "So, do we have a deal?"

Kensi paused and realised that he had missed a very certain someone out on the list and she hoped that that meant that either they hadn't researched deep enough or he was still undercover. Although she was certain that they would have let Callen know about her being missing ASAP and she knew that he would come after her no matter what, like he had promised. All she had to do was to stay alive and stay there until then, which meant stalling. And considering that she was currently partially blind, she was sure that would be a good reason to why she couldn't direct them properly with the body dumps.

"Well?" the man in charge asked again.

"Alright." she sighed in fake sorrow although she didn't like it either. "We have a deal."

* * *

_**Hope you liked it and it was worth the wait for see what really was happening to Kensi! Thanks sooooo much for all adds, faves, alerts and the positive feedback on the last chapter Cowboy's Girl, evershort, Allie, grdkaitlyn, MaidL93, TWHATT18, lovely9000 and Sairs J. Please R&R and I hope you enjoyed this!**_


	7. Chapter 7

They had parked the car on the other side of the busy main road to where the alleyway was. They had gotten there a good 25 minutes too early and now they sat in silence, looking out of the windows at the single place on the lookout for the man that Callen was going to meet. The silence wasn't like them, but there was nothing to joke about when one of their team members was missing, least of all when it was Kensi. She was Callen's wife, Sam's little sister, Deeks' partner, Eric's big sister and even Hetty's kind of daughter. There was no question in the fact that if they lost her, there would be a massive gaping hole in their team structure that noone would ever be able to fill or get over.

Unable to take the silence any more, Sam broke it. "Hey, G, listen," he started and even though his partner didn't turn his head to look at him, he knew that he had his attention. "I messed up earlier when I sent Kensi and Deeks down the other corridor. I should have sent some of the others with them too instead of splitting us all up." he said, knowing that he knew what he was talking about because they had all filled him in with the events of earlier that day.

Callen still didn't look at him but shrugged. "Wasn't your fault. Noone could have known how many corridors there were ahead or how many of them there were." he told him, but Sam realised that there was no emotion in his voice and he didn't know whether that was because he was already in character to go meet with the man who might be involved with Kensi's kidnapping, or because he didn't mean the words he said.

"Yeah, but still-" Sam started but Callen cut him off.

"Sam, it's done. We all mess up but we have to put that in the past and focus on what's happening now." he told him, finally looking over at him. There was still no emotion in his voice and Sam could tell him was talking from experience, probably from the time a year ago or so when they had been dealing with the Russians and his orders had led to them taking and almost killing Kensi too. But he also could tell that he wasn't blaming him at all and that he was taking his own advice and focusing on the now. "Let's just get her back." he said and Sam nodded before they both went back to looking out the window once again.

5 minutes later, they saw a man in a pressed shirt and pants enter the alleyway and they knew it was him by both the look of him and the photos from earlier. They both got out of the car and made their way over towards the alleyway slowly, listening out in case he was meeting anyone else, especially if they were part of the group too. There was the murmur of a couple of voices, both male, but it didn't seem related to what they were interested in so Callen indicated that he would go ahead to talk to him while Sam lingered back just in case, but also to look like a guard.

Callen was dressed smart too, in a plain black shirt and pants, to give the image of having money, something that was backed up by their posh Aston Martin car. It was obvious that the men they were after were all in it for the money, and they had turned down the boy who Callen had gotten his info from so they had assumed that they only spoke and cared about those with money and not gang members. They were sort of a more higher class of criminals, but criminals nonetheless.

"Hey!" Callen called out when he got further down the alleyway and closer to the man. He couldn't see him properly yet, but could see him turn to look at him as the other man simply stood and stared too. "I think we have something to talk about."

The man they were after only raised an eyebrow and smirked lightly. "Do I know you?" he asked, carefully eyeing both Callen and Sam as he joined them.

"You'll want to when I tell you that I can offer you better business than _him_." he said, nodding towards the other man who didn't look too happy with the interruption.

The other man scoffed. "You don't look like a dealer." he said and Callen ignored him and kept on looking at the other man who was starting to show some interest in what he was saying.

"That's because I'm not." he told him before adding. "I meant your _other_ business." he said so that he got the message. The man nodded and turned back towards the other man to hand him something before shooing him away. He left without another word, glad to get some money and drugs for his work.

"What business do you think you mean?" He asked Callen once he was sure they were alone and stepped a bit closer. Callen kept his face blank as he stepped closer to keep himself in character and keep on with the plan.

"The money one." he said and when the other man shook his head and stepped away, he tried again. "The kidnapping one." The man stopped and turned around. "Yeah, I know about that. I have contacts in deep places and I know you're involved."

"Don't know what you're talking about." he said but Callen could see through the lie easily because of all the taletell signs both in his body and voice that he hadn't been trained to hide.

Callen stepped a bit closer this time and told him the 4 names of the victims that they had linked to them, only one of which they knew for sure was them. But by the way that he reacted, Callen was certain that the other three that his contact had told him about was good information and true. "Know what I'm talking about now?"

"Who told you?" he asked and Callen shrugged and looked over the man's shoulder for a moment to seem nonchalant.

"Doesn't matter." he said but the other man shook his head.

"Yes, it does." he told him and when Callen remained quiet, he pulled out a gun from behind his back and pointed it at him. "I said, who told you?" Callen remained silent, not liking the turn in events. They had wanted him to react with a bit of trust and appreciation when they announced they knew about the murders and either be impressed and let him in to their group or even give them more info about having another hostage, Kensi. This wasn't going to get them either right then. "I'll shoot. And I'll shoot to kill."

"Two against one, you really want to risk it?" Callen said, looking back at Sam who already had his hand behind his back, no doubt already on the gun just in case. Sam gave him a look that told him to choose what to do and to quit stalling and he knew that he was right. They didn't have time to waste, and with the plan going awry, he had to make do. "Fine. It was Morgan. Chris Morgan." he told the man and he froze a second before laughing.

"Really? Morgan told you?" he laughed and cocked the gun and Callen heard Sam do the same behind him. "Funny, because I killed him this afternoon."

Callen hadn't been expecting that and when the man took to aim, he quickly reacted and grabbed his arm to disarm him. It wasn't easy because he guessed he was use to fights and using guns, but Callen eventually managed to get him to drop the gun and kick it away before pushed him up against the wall with an arm behind his back. "You killed Morgan?" he asked him in a threatening manner, now no longer in his character. He could see Sam pick up the gun from the corner of his eye before coming closer. "Who else have you killed today?"

"What's it to you?" the man groaned as Callen twisted his arm more and pushed it against his body harder in the wrong direction. "Who are you?"

"G." Sam said as a warning, and he knew that he had to let him go so that they could question him properly and get more answers out of him, but Callen didn't let go straight away.

"I said, who else have you killed today?" he repeated and the man answered hurriedly when he pushed him once again.

"Noone, I swear." he told him and Callen wasn't sure whether he believed him or not but let him go anyway so that Sam could cuff him and they could take him into custody and down to the boathouse to question him. He wanted to believe him because that gave him hope that Kensi was still alive, but he knew that there was more than him involved in the kidnapping so he couldn't let himself believe in either until he had proof. "What are you doing? Who are you?"

Callen could hear Sam dragging the man out of the alleyway behind him as he kept on questioning them until Sam finally told him that they were NCIS and he was under arrest for murder and involvment in another 4 murders and the kidnapping of a federal agent. The man argued that it wasn't him but fell quiet when he realised they weren't paying attention to him. It was all Callen could do to not turn around and punch the man or even shoot him, so instead, he ignored him and got into the driver's seat of the car as Sam pushed the man into the back and slammed the door shut.

As soon as Sam was in, he pressed down the accelarotor and sped down the street faster than ever before. This time though, not even Sam told him off and he knew it was because it was the only way he was getting out his currently pent up anger at the fact that they hadn't gotten any information so far or the plan hadn't gone as they had liked it. The only thing that kept him from doing anything more stupid was the fact that the man knew something about it all and could give them the answers they needed, and Callen was sure that he would when he was through with him, and that he had promised Kensi long ago that he would always come after her if something happened, and he knew that if he didn't something stupid, it would just ruin that promise.

* * *

_**I am really sorry for the very late update! I have just too much going on with university and working and whatnot. But I hope this chapter was worth the wait. Also, a MASSIVE thank you to everyone who added, faved, alerted and reviewed the last chapter. 11 reviews! That's the most I've ever gotten for a chapter so thank you all majorly - Sairs J, grdkaitlyn, evershort, .grace, MadiL93, liesel, tibbee, ilovecallenblye, Kensicallen88, Cowboy's Girl and iloveblye. I hope you enjoy this chapter too!**_


	8. Chapter 8

After they had gotten the man that would give them more information about their case and where Kensi possibly was, they headed straight to the boathouse where they had left him in the interrogation room for a little while by himself while they spoke to Deeks who was waiting there for them already. He told them that the man's name was Mitch Anderson and that he was in fact resposible for murdering Chris Morgan, but not the other girl. At least, the DNA and forensics said that he was responsible from murdering Morgan and there was nothing relating to him with the Petty Officer's murder.

Happy with the little information that they had received, Sam and Callen entered the interrogation room whilst Deeks watched from the outside. They were all determined to get the answers that they wanted and needed out of this man and none of them had any doubts that it wouldn't be possible, especially if they pushed the boundries a bit which Sam suspected they would. He sat down at the table opposite to where Anderson sat and Callen joined him a second later.

He started speaking straight away, having no time to waste. "We have proof that you killed Chris Morgan, Anderson." he said and they watched his eyebrows raise when he said his name but nothing else in response to the words. "Now tell us why we shouldn't believe you killed the woman we found this morning."

"Because it wasn't me." he insisted and when the other two didn't seem interested in his answer, he carried on. "If I admitted to one murder, why wouldn't I admit to another?" he said.

"Because if you did, then that might mean that you killed the other 3 women too." Callen said and Anderson stayed quiet at his words before shaking his head.

"It wasn't me." he said again. "I only helped with the planning before the kidnapping and finding women to take. Nothing else. Boss wouldn't let me."

Sam picked up on the name and asked very skeptically. "Boss?" he asked and Anderson shrugged and nodded.

"He's the one in charge. He's the one who found me dealing and told me he had an easier way to make money." he told them.

"What's his real name?" Sam asked.

"I don't know. Noone does. He's just 'Boss'." he told them and Callen showed him a couple of pictures from earlier that day from the warehouse.

He pointed towards them and asked him. "Tell me who these are." he said and Anderson stayed quiet for a moment. "Let me help you." he said and pointed to one of the people in a picture and then another. "This is Morgan, and this is you. Who are the other two?"

Anderson sighed and pointed at the other two people in the pictures slowly. "Boss." he said as he pointed to the first one and it was fairly easy to see that he was the boss with the way he stood in the middle and seemed to be in charge. "This is Taylor."

"Taylor?" Callen asked for him to give them his first name too.

"Greg Taylor." Anderson said and sighed again. "He's the doctor. He's the one in charge of the murders. Tells us how to kill them so that it's less messy and quick and painless. He's a do-gooder caught up in the wrong world." he explained and the two agents got the feeling that he actually symphasized with the Taylor man.

Sam nodded and questioned him more. "What was in the warehouse?" he asked him.

"Nothing." he said.

"Then why were you there?" he asked him again and Anderson shrugged again.

"Boss wanted us to meet up." he said coolly but the other two weren't in the mood to pretend to play along.

Callen spoke up first to get straight to the point so that they could move away from the murders and get to finding Kensi. "We know that's where the other bodies were." he told him and the look on his face told them that they had gotten it right. "We searched that place inside out. Where did they go?"

"I dunno." he said.

"You're lying." Sam replied simply and harshly.

Anderson shrugged. "Prove it." he said.

Sam opened his mouth to argue, but Callen cut him off with a quick look when he heard a muted, buzzing sound. It was in a rhythm and it was in the very familiar pattern of a cell phone. Only, it wasn't their cells and they had patted Anderson down and taken away all personal belongings before he had entered the room. So that only meant that he had one hidden that they hadn't managed to find or get and he hadn't managed to turn off in time.

Sam spoke this time. "Where is it?" he asked him crossly.

"Where's what?" he asked back.

Sam opened his mouth to say something else but Callen beat him to it this time. "Stand up." he told him in his usually calm manner while standing up himself, though he was anything but calm on the inside. His partner saw this and stood up too just to be on the safe side though he knew that Callen knew what the limits were.

When Anderson didn't do as he said, Callen walked around the table and pulled the other man up by his shirt and pushed him away from his chair and towards the back wall. He didn't need to say anything as he shoved him very hard against the wall after turning him around so that he was faced to the wall, and Sam came and stood on the man's other side cautiously.

"Where is it?" Callen asked him this time, holding the man to the wall with a hand behind his neck.

Anderson struggled a bit but had no option but to reply. "In my shoe." he said and Sam immediately checked to see the man wore small boots and there was a cell phone stuck to his ankle just below the cuff of the boot. "Happy? Let me go."

Callen shoved him before letting him go before taking the phone from Sam and walking over to the other side, but this time didn't sit down like his partner did. Instead, he stood by the other wall, opening up the flip cell phone and going through it quickly to see what was in it. "Looks like your _boss_ wants you." he said when seeing that the miss call had come from him.

"I said I would be back by now." Anderson told him with a shrug. The two agents eyed him carefully and this time it was Sam who spoke.

"Back from the deal or from killing Morgan?" he asked and the other man remained silent this time. "Why did you kill Morgan, Mitch? Was it orders?" when he still didn't reply he carried on. "What are the chances of him sending someone after you to meet the same fate if we tell him that you've told us all?"

Anderson's eyes widened slightly at his words and they understood without words that it was a possibility that the 'Boss' guy would send someone else to finish him, which gave them an advantage.

Letting out a tired sigh, Callen decided to cut to the chase again. "Alright, listen. You clearly don't want this guy to find out that you've spoken to us, and we can cut you a deal _if_ you help us out." he told him and Anderson nodded slowly.

"Help you out, how?" he asked hesitantly.

"We'll start off with answering some questions." Callen said as he kept a hold of the cell phone just in case it rang again. "Why did you kill Morgan?"

Anderson stayed quiet for a minute before replying. "Because I was told to." he said. The agents stayed quiet this time, and with a simple stare, managed to get him to carry on. "He was dropping hints, inadvertantly, to people on the outside and he needed to be stopped."

"What kind of people?" Sam asked but Anderson shrugged in response. Instead of persuing that line of questioning, he went to the more urgent and important questions that they had for him. "We don't care about Morgan or your little drug ring. Earlier, at the warehouse, you took one of our agents. Where is she?"

"I don't know." he replied without even thinking about the answer, which was a clear sign to them that he was lying.

Callen shook his head and held up the man's cell phone. "One press of the button is all it takes, Mitch. You want to try again?" he asked sternly, nearing the table slowly while keeping his eyes on the man in question.

"I don't _know_." he repeated much to the two agents' anger.

"One last chance." Callen told him while flipping open the cell phone in a gesture that he would definately carry out his threat. Although he knew that it wouldn't be the best idea, to lose their only lead, if he wasn't going to give them anything informative, he saw no reason to keep him around. At least, not right then. "I'm not bluffing here and I know you know what will happen if I call your boss."

Anderson leant forward a bit with a small smile that only irritated the agents more. "See, I think you are bluffing. You can question me all you like on Morgan, but I know what's important to Boss. And I also know that, as Federal Agents, you'll have to keep me in your custody and therefore in protection from anyone who tries to kill me."

"You'll get protection if you cooperate." Sam added roughly but Anderson sat back again and shrugged.

"You guys dedicate your lives to helping others and making sure justice is served. You won't let me die." he said, causing Callen to raise and eyebrow as he stepped up to the table and stared him down with a hard glare.

"You sure about that?" he asked him. "A toss up between one of our agents and you, and you think we'll keep you safe? How is that justice, exactly?" Anderson kept quiet this time and Callen could see that some of his bravado had left him at his words. "Like he said, we don't care about Morgan or the drugs. If you don't tell us what we do care about, we'll let you back onto the streets and put in a call to your dear boss. You'll be out of our way before the sun even rises and don't think for a second we'll regret it."

There was silence as the man on the other side of the table thought about it before gazing down at where his cell phone laid on the table now, just half an inch away from Callen's hand, and then back up at him. There was more to this story, to the missing agent, then they were letting on. He knew what would happen if he ratted out the rest of the people in their operation but he also knew by the look in the agents' eyes that there was truth behind the words from the man who had just spoken. And he knew that his boss wouldn't hesitate to kill him to stop anyone else from finding out where they were or what they were doing. Which only meant one thing.

"If I tell you, will you promise to give me protection?" he asked them and they both nodded, singularly, in response and he guessed it was the best he was going to get. "Ok."

* * *

_**Big apologies for the late update! My course got really hectic and any time I had to spare went to eating or sleeping so I apologize majorly. Thank you to all of you who reviewed and have not given up on me. I promise the next chapter should be up quicker [like within the week]. Major thanks to evershort, Sairs_J, ilovecallenblye, grdkaitlyn, Madil93, Cowboy's Girl, Lover of Reid, Callenlover and jimmel for the reviews. Each one [or the multiple ones from a few =D ] have made me write this quicker and get it up. I hope you enjoy this chapter too and I hope you reviews once again.**_


	9. Chapter 9

They had left him in the interrogation room as they sat in front of the TV in the main room of the boathouse with Deeks to communicate with Eric and Hetty via the link. Once filling in the others with what Anderson had told them and tossing around a few theories, they had came up with a plan with what to do with him and his cell phone.

"It's not unreasonable to expect them to expect _us_ to come after them." Callen stated from where he perched against the table with his arms crossed as he thought of the best way to use their advantage. "But they wouldn't expect it to be through Anderson." he carried on as the others nodded.

Sam spoke up from where he sat on the couch, facing the TV screen more even though he spoke to them all. "He said that only the guy in charge, '_Boss'_, recruits them, so if we tagged along, we'd be made in a second." he told them.

Hetty nodded at their words, even though she had been watching the interrogation herself. "Yes, but how does this help us?" she saw a familiar look on the other three men faces' that she had seen before when they had come up with a plan that was slightly on the wrong side of the line. "Well?" Usually, she preferred denialibilty, but right then, she needed to know what they planned to do to get her agent back safe.

"He missed a call from the guy in charge." Callen stated, not comfortable with calling him 'Boss' if he didn't have to. "Which means he'll know something's up. So we play into that."

Hetty waited a moment for more but when they didn't go on, she said, "Explain."

"We get Anderson to call him back, saying that we caught up with him but let him go because he convinced us that he was just a drug supplier and we were more focused on getting Kensi back." Callen told her, sticking to as much professionalism as he could as he thought about the time that was ticking past. It had just passed the 12 hour mark since she had been taken and there had been nothing to ensure that she was still alive apart from hope and a lack of a body. "That'll confirm that we're coming after them. Anderson will go back to where they have her and we'll follow. He said that there are a few roads that lead up to it and it's pretty secluded for miles around with hardly anyone ever passing."

A silence followed in which the three in the boathouse waited for one of the other two to ask a question that they were waiting for. It took only a few more seconds before Eric spoke up. "But if they're expecting you to come after them, won't they be on the lookout for anyone except for them approaching where they are?"

"Exactly." Sam smirked, only to receive a very questioning and demanding look from Hetty.

"Let me get this straight. Instead of using Anderson and the cell phone to possibly negotiate a deal to get Ms Blye back, you want to send him back with one of you following, _knowing _that you'll get caught and risk getting captured or killed as well?" she asked sceptically and the others all nodded, leaving the explaining to Callen, who they knew was the only one who could most possibly change and coerc Hetty. "Do you care to explain what will happen after this?"

"After they find out that we know where they are, they'll have to move." Callen told her. "Either that or risk us coming back, full fled with backup and storming the place."

"Why are we not going for the second option right now? We have an insider who you could send in to survey the place before we go in." Hetty asked and Callen simply shook his head.

"It's too dangerous." he said, earning himself raised eyebrows from the other two on the screen as they thought about the hyprocrisy in his statement. "The place is like a giant, empty maze. Chances of us storming into the place and actually finding Kensi are slim, let alone us finding her before one of them find us and kill her there and then." he explained and Hetty nodded, clearly impressed by the answer and the thought they had put behind it.

Deeks spoke up for the first time since they had started their conversation to finish off telling the rest of the plan from where he stood next to the table, slightly agitated to go and do something to sit. "Anyway, once they start moving, Anderson will give us the heads up. Even if he backs out, we'll be watching. And that's when we'll strike!" he finished with determination and a small smirk that only made the other two agents with him shake their heads. "Not only should we be able to get Kensi back, but we should be able to find the other two bodies they're hiding and capture the rest of them."

Hetty let out a long breath as she thought over the plan before nodding once. "Sounds like a plan, Mr Callen." she said and he nodded once as well. "How long until it's put into action?"

"As soon as we've scripted Anderson with what to say." he told her. "Then it'll be another hour or so before we let him leave and then it's up to them."

"Very well. Keep me up to date with the progress." she told him before adding almost hesistantly. "Mr Callen, I feel as if I should warn you that there is a lot riding on this and that if something goes wrong, that the best action would be to abort and try again. Nothing too drastic and nothing without a well thought out and backedup plan. But you already know that, correct?"

Callen paused for a moment, fixing his jaw as he thought about it. In all honesty, if push came to shove, there would be no way that he would abort. If he was close enough and it didn't seem like Kensi was in mortal danger, he would do what he did best and improvise to get her out of there. But that wasn't what their operational manager wanted to hear. "Of course." he lied stiffly and Hetty nodded before walking away, terminating the call and leaving the three others to carry out their plan.

* * *

_**Sorry about the delay once again, and about this short chapter, and the lack of personal gratitude that's usually down here in my AN. I'm running out of time on this public computer as mine has died on me so I have to be as quick as I can lol. I hope you enjoyed this and I will try to update ASAP. Please r&r!**_


	10. Chapter 10

Kensi was surprised to find that the chair they had made her sit in, followed by cuffing a wrist to it's armrest, was rather comfy. She wasn't sure how long she had been sitting there for, but if she had to guess, she'd put it at over 3 hours. After making the deal with the guy who was simply referred to as 'Boss', he had rather kindly guided her to the chair and made her sit. It hadn't stopped her from asking questions about how that was going to help them, even if she only got a response of small chuckle.

Her eyesight was still near blinding. Every time she thought she'd open her eyes and brave the lights, which were now dimmed down a bit, it caused a sharp pain to travel along her eye nerves and straight to her head and jaw, forcing them close. Even if she didn't, she couldn't see a thing anyway. If there was something that she had learnt from them, it was that they were clever, making it very hard for her to identify any of them or the place they were in to ensure escape when it came to it. But Kensi knew that no matter what they tried, she'd try harder to stop them.

The warehouse was quiet apart from some small musings and murmurs between the 3 men in the room with her. She was fairly sure that there was only three, all of whom spoken perfect English with a Californian accent. She'd even picked up the slight differences in the voices and associated them with the names that she had heard. Boss, Taylor and Wilson. Out of them all, Taylor had been the nicer one, the one who had handed her a bottle of water when she asked for it, who had _gently_ cuffed her to the chair, and the one who she would be using as a way out.

Suddenly, the quiet of the warehouse was broken by the ringing of a cellphone. Kensi held her breath to listen out for any clues that she might be able to pick up from the phonecall. She had expected it to be one sided, but was surprised when the phone was put onto speakerphone.

"Anderson. Where are you?" The voice she recognised as Boss spoke. She remembered hearing the name Anderson before, about how they couldn't reach him and how they wondered if he was done with Morgan.

_"NCIS caught up with me. But I'm heading back now."_ Anderson's voice came across the line. Kensi had to bite back a smile at the words, glad to know that the team were on the right track to finding her.

"They caught up with you? Why?" Boss asked, worry and agitation clear in his voice.

_"Something to do with that agent of their's." _He answered before adding quickly, albeit nervously, something that Kensi found suspicious. _"But I convinced them that I was just supplying and they bought it. They're too focused on finding her that they disregarded me."_

"Ok." Boss replied after a pause. "Make sure that they're not tailing you and head back immediately. We'll have to speed up the plans and get moving just in case they're bluffing." He said.

_"You got it Boss. I'll be there in 30." _He said coughing lightly before adding. _"If you've got someone watching the road by the, uh..., the fern trees, pull them back. I'll be using that road."_

Kensi didn't know whether to be amused or pissed at the use of word, but she simply squashed it down with the relief that the secret message gave her. They weren't just on the right track, they were still following it. It was obvious to her that Anderson was being scripted, which meant that he was still under their custody. Which meant that they knew that he knew where she was. Which meant that they were most probably coming for her.

The realisation hit her quickly and she wasn't sure whether to be excited or nervous. Not only could she not see, but she had no weapon and the place was a maze. She wouldn't be able to do anything to get herself out whilst they were moving. And by the sounds of it, the place was pretty well guarded. Which meant that she had to go along with it and leave it all up to her team to get her out of there. It wasn't that she didn't trust them, she did, immensely, it was just that she wasn't use to being useless. She just hoped that they didn't get themselves hurt in the process, because if there's one thing she's learnt, it's that these people were pretty brutal when it came to survival. They had, after all, killed 4 women simply for money.

"...fern trees in this climate. They're palm trees." Kensi caught the end of Taylor's sentence with a bit of amusement.

_"Sorry. You know what I mean."_ Anderson replied before exchanging goodbyes and hanging up. The murmurings began once again, this time more urgent and louder. They were planning on moving, and soon. And if she knew her team, then that's when they will be coming for her.

* * *

He wasn't sure whether to be suspicious or relived that their plan had worked out. It had seemed such a simple and easy plan that had left many doors open for something to go wrong, and Callen knew that when they left a base uncovered, it was usually that which went wrong. However, here they were, less than an hour after the call, waiting on the stretch of road that was hidden by many trees that looked down to the warehouse over 40 feet away where their suspects, and Kensi, was. And now, Anderson.

They hadn't been able to bug him in any sort of way, heeding to the warning that his boss would be on the lookout for such an obvious thing and search him to make sure that he was in fact free from NCIS. Apperently, he trusted noone, which could be good or bad for them. Callen wasn't sure which it was.

Sam shifted in the passenger's seat next to him, bringing him back to reality. They were both focused on the warehouse, waiting for any sign or movement for them to make a move. It was still the dead of the night and the only light was a dim glare coming from a few high up windows.

"Nothing?" Callen asked his partner, dryly, turning to glance at him as he propped an elbow up on the door and rested his head on his hand.

"Nope." Sam replied, putting down the night vision goggles for a moment to look at the site normally. "Deeks?" he asked through their earpieces.

"Ditto." the LAPD detective replied with a sigh. He was positioned on the other side of the warehouse so that between them, they had all four sides covered. "Did Eric manage to find any surveillance then?"

"No. Nothing." Callen told him though they hadn't expected much. There was a murmur of disappointment from the other man before they fell back into silence, keeping their eyes trained hard on their point of interest.

Time passed in silence, every minute stretching into the next until the hours began to go by too. There wasn't anything left to do for them but to sit and wait, but unfortunately, that was the last thing that any one of them were good at doing. They needed action, to be busy, to be at least feeling as if they were involved with pushing forward the case. Not sitting and waiting. But it was the only thing that they could do, so they stuck it out without a complaint for their teammate.

Callen looked at his phone once again, only to find that only another hour had passed since he had last looked. Another 90 minutes and the sun would start to rise. Letting out a sigh of frustration, he ignored the questioning look from Sam and kept his eyes ahead. His left thumb carried on continuously twisting around the gold band on his left ring finger. He had picked it up when he had made the brief trip home to get changed after getting back from his cover. The ring had been where it was always; on the bathroom counter next to his wife's own one and another simple diamond one. He had slipped it into his jeans pocket, knowing that he couldn't wear it on his meet with Anderson, but made sure to keep it with him so that he could put it on when he was free to. The weight of it was odd, almost unfamiliar, yet comforting.

"Guys..." Deeks' warning tone snapped him back to the present and he saw Sam sit up straight out of the corner of his eyes. "I think I have moment."

"You _think_?" Callen asked sceptically.

"I'm pretty sure." he reiterated. "Wait, the door just opened... Yup. They're moving." he told them, a mix of agitation and exicitement in his voice.

"Any sign of Kensi?" Sam asked as Callen paused and thought things through. They didn't really have a plan with what to do now, and there was no margin for error in this.

"Nothing yet." Deeks replied with a sigh. "What should I do?" he asked, eager to get moving.

Sam stayed quiet and looked towards his partner. He called the shots for this, no matter what they thought. Not when it came to Kensi. "You wait." Callen answered finally.

"What?" Deeks' disbelief was clear before sighing.

"I said, you wait." he repeated with a bit more force. "Until we have eyes on her, we don't do anything." Callen told him before looking over at Sam. "How close to you reckon we can get in the cars without them hearing?"

Sam shook his head. "Not close enough if we don't wanna risk it." he admitted and Callen nodded.

"Deeks?"

"Same. They'll hear us in this silence." he told him.

"Alright. Let's get going then." Callen said, already opening the car door to step out.

"Wha-?" Sam began, only to be beaten by Deeks.

"I thought you said we wait."

"We do." Callen confirmed, already walking closer to the path that would take them downwards with Sam following. "But we get as close as possible."

Deeks followed his orders and crept as close as he could while still maintaining enough distance so that the light from the car's headlights that had just been switched on from the guy he recognised as Taylor didn't make him visible. There was enough trees and shrubs to keep him hidden. He wasn't sure how long it had been before his knees started to ache at his position. But before he could even whisper a complaint, his eyes came across who they were there for.

"I see her." he told the others through their earpieces. "But she's still inside."

"Ok. Stay put until I say so." Callen replied. "We're going to enter the building from this side. You try to get her eye and let her know we're here without letting the others see."

"Right." Deeks breathed out, not impressed that he had gotten the hardest job. But he wouldn't complain or go against it, knowing that it was essential to get Kensi back safely. Taking a deep breath, he stood up and got closer. If he was to catch her eye and get her attention he had to be in a little vulnerable position. He just hoped that the wrong people didn't see and didn't get killed in the process. Or worse, get Kensi killed.

* * *

**_Whoa! I'm still so amazed to get all those reviews and views for this little fic of mine! It gets my writing, as you can see. A long chapter which I could not stop writing. Many of you are wondering whether the plan will work out... Well, here's the start of it. And the end of it will be in the next chapter. Hehe. Sorry, but once again, I'm running out of time to individually thank you all. But I do read and appreciate and LOVE every single review! I hoped you liked this chapter and please R&R!_**


	11. Chapter 11

They entered the building stealthily through the side door, guns drawn, leading them straight into a corridor. There were no sounds or even a hint of anyone nearby, and by the commentary that Deeks was giving them, they were pretty sure everyone involved was near the front exit where they planned to escape. Taking Kensi with them.

Neither said a word, being able to communicate with slight motions and eyes after working together for so many years. They carried down the corridor, checking each room they came across and took care around every corner, but still found nothing. That was until they reached what they assumed to be the main room of the warehouse. It was a huge room with plenty of crates to hide behind as they made their way across.

Scuffled footsteps were audible as was low murmurings and the soft sounds of rustling. Callen took a peek around one corner to see a man he didn't recognise from the photos, and therefore must have been Wilson, hurriedly folding up what looked like plastic that had been laying across the floor. Exchanging a look with Sam, who nodded to say that there was noone else nearby, Callen stepped out of the shadows once Wilson's back was towards him and spoke up.

"NCIS. Stop what you're doing and turn around." he commended calmly. The man froze, dropping the tarp and held up his hand in a surrendering position. He began to turn slowly as Callen kept his gun trained on him. However, Wilson only made it halfway before he began to run. Callen frowned, and shook his head, not having the time or energy to even comment on his stupidity as Sam came out of his hiding place and stopped the man from going any further.

"That was stupid." Sam told the man who was now on the floor. He quickly cuffed him and pulled him up. "Where's our agent?"

"Who?" Wilson asked, voice shaky but still emotionless.

"You know who." Callen added coldly, looking around the area and seeing the odd blood drops on the floor and more spread on the fallen piece of plastic. He couldn't help but think the worst when he saw it, but he pushed all thoughts to the back of his head, having to remain cool and collected if he was to find her.

"She's not here." he replied and Sam gripped him tighter.

"Who said our agent was a 'she'?" he growled. Wilson swallowed and looked towards the other side of the room where there was a closed a door.

"That'll take you there." he told him and Sam let him go, uncuffing one wrist to cuff it to a pillar that held the building up. "Hey!"

Both agents ignored him as the made their way over to where he had said. However, once they had crossed the threshold, the only thing on the other side was another corridor, this one seeming neverending once again.

* * *

Deeks had tried his best for the past 5 minutes to try and capture his partner's eye every time she came into view, always facing out towards him, but had failed each time.

Letting out a breath, he trekked closer to the warehouse, pausing when he heard the familiar sounds of an approaching truck. Relaying the information to Callen and Sam, he watched with one eye still on Kensi as they loaded something into it. It too a moment for Deeks to come to the horrible realisation that the packages were in fact the 3 missing women, now bodies, that were linked to this case.

Filing that piece of info along with details about the truck for later, he rounded to the right as he saw the man who had been keeping Kensi inside, the man he recognised as the one in charge, joined Taylor and Anderson with loading the bodies. He found it odd that they had left Kensi alone, with their backs to her and the open door, but he wasn't to look a gift horse in the mouth. The lights from the truck was caused a glare from it's brightness but Deeks worked around it until he got into the perfect position so that he could see Kensi perfectly.

He had his gun out and ready in case anyone else saw him, though he was still hidden by a few scattered trees, as he tried to catch Kensi's attention once again. He could move more freely through the shrubs as the noise from the running truck and their moving was enough to cover it. He purposely rustled some of the leaves to hopefully get her to look at him, but all that he got was her to turn her head in his direction. Confusion took over him as he saw her tight jaw, a mask on her face that kept any emotion back apart from the clear annoyance and pain.

Taking a few steps closer, Deeks watched as she kept her face turned in his direction but eyes squinted so much that they were almost shut. Glancing over at the others to make sure that they wouldn't see him, he stepped closer, using one of their cars that was quite far from their range of hearing as shield. Confusion overtook him as he kept his eyes on his partner before realisation sunk in.

Eyes widening, he cursed and squatted next to the car to hide before speaking to the others. "Noone's guarding Kensi. They're loading the bodies onto the truck." Deeks told them and carried on before they could question him. "But guys, I don't think she can see me."

"Get closer then." Sam hissed into his ear and Deeks shook his head though he knew he wouldn't be able to see him.

"No, I mean-" he broke off, not sure what he meant exactly. "I don't think she can't see, _at all, _guys." he said.

"Does she know you're there?" Callen asked him quietly.

"I don't think she knows it's me. She knows it's someone though." he told him.

"We're still inside. Can you get to her?" he asked him and Deeks peeked up to see what was going on, surprised to see that the three men were moving once again.

"Wait, they're moving." Deeks murmured, watching as Taylor and Anderson reentered the warehouse whilst Boss stayed by the door, probably to keep on eye on Kensi. "Taylor and Anderson just went back into the building. It's just this guy and Kensi."

Silence came as a reply and Deeks almost spoke up when Callen replied. "Get moving, then." he said and Deeks sighed.

"Gladly." he muttered.

With another quick look at the situation, he ducked back down behind the car as he holstered the gun once again. Taking a deep breath, he stood up, walking out from behind the car and directly into the guy's view.

"Hey!" Boss called out to him in anger and Deeks put up his hands in surrender as he slowed down, still nearing him. "What do you think you're doing?"

"That's a good question! I have no idea where I even am!" Deeks laughed forcefully, glancing over at his partner who seem to have both relaxed at the fact that he was there but then tensed at the realisation. Before he could think of why, he carried on with his act. "See, I was driving, but my car broke, so I had to walk. And I've been walking for-"

A low laugh broke him off and Deeks realised that the man didn't seem so phased by his appearance anymore or bothered by his story. "Please, cut the bull, Detective Deeks."

"Detecti-?" He began in confusion, hoping that he'd fall for it, but when it became clear that he wouldn't, Deeks let out a sigh. "Look, I don't want any trouble."

"Tough." Boss replied, tugging roughly at Kensi's arm. She had turned her head away from where Deeks had been, and as she was pulled closer to the other man, he could see her stiffen. Her operative skills had kicked in, and despite the clear pain she was in, she was ready to fight. He hoped it wouldn't get that far. "Now, let's talk."

Deeks hesitated, wondering silently where the other two were. Of course, remembering that the other men had re-entered the building a little while before, he guessed that they had caused a small distraction. "Ok, sure. We can talk." He agreed, watching as Kensi opened her eyes once again. He tried to catch them, but failed again. Getting her free was going to be a mission without being able to communicate with her.

"You leave now, and you tell the others you have here to leave too." Boss told him, and Deeks silently raised an eyebrow at him in disbelieve. "Then, in a day or two, you can have your agent back. Whether she'll be alive if dependent on your ability to follow orders."

"Right. I'm going to have to go with no." He replied. He saw Kensi's mouth open to say something, probably to argue, but before she could, Boss pulled out a knife from behind his back and had pulled her closer to him so that she was right him front of him. "Whoa! Hold on! Let's talk."

Boss laughed as he held the knife to her throat and she stiffened at the feeling of the cold blade against her exposed skin. Deeks could her try to say something once again, but was stopped as the knife pressed harder against her neck. "Don't say a word." He warned her.

Deeks had pulled out his own weapon, but there was no opportunity to get him without risking hitting his partner too. If he could have told her to shift even the slightest, they might have had a chance, but they still couldn't communicate without the man in question hearing either.

A sudden banging sound from inside the building startled them all, and Deek saw who he thought was Taylor escape across behind Boss somewhere down the corridor. He had been too far and quick for him to try to apprehend, not to mention that there was a more pressing matter at hand.

It didn't take more than a second for it to run through his head, but even in that time, he failed to notice the guy's grip on his partner had loosened, as had the knife from her throat. Kensi, however, hadn't, and it only took a split second for her to lift up a hand and push away the knife, holding tightly onto the arm to stop him to trying to attack her.

She moved quick, too quick for Deeks to try and work around. Before he knew it, she was no longer being held at knifepoint and stood with her back to him. But Boss still had a tight grip on her other arm, meaning that she couldn't let go of his other.

"Deeks!" She called out to him in a voice that he knew meant 'take the shot'. The only problem was that the only time he found to take a shot, he knew that would hit her too.

"Keep still and I will!" He hissed at her, aiming his gun and approaching them.

He saw Boss see him get closer and let go of her arm, deciding to not take the risk as he failed to use her as protection once again. Deeks waited for him to run, for Kensi to let go of _his_ arm, so that he could put a bullet in his leg, or back, or both.

However, instead of him running away, he used Kensi's grip on his arm to pull her closer. Hoping that he wasn't going to play the same game again, Deeks edged closer before worrying when he saw her freeze all of a sudden.

He knew what had happened even before her grip on the other guy had slipped and he had backed away. Deeks had aimed, shooting twice, both times aimed at his head, only to miss when he had ducked into the safety of the building.

"Kensi!" He called out as he ran the very short distance to her, grabbing onto her elbow just as her legs began to give way.

"Deeks-" She began before hissing in pain as one of his hands pushed away hers from where the knife had sliced into her side to get a better look before applying pressure. He helped her back towards a wall before she collapsed, letting her slide down as he quickly informed Eric that they needed an ambulance _now_ before letting the other two know what had happened.

"Dammit, Kensi, you hold on, ok. It's not even that bad." He tried to assure her, but he guessed that she didn't have to see the blood to know that it really was. Applying as much pressure onto it as he could, despite her gasps of pain, he looked around to see if there was anything else that could help them. All he could see was the knife that he hadn't seen being dropped. "Kensi, you still with me, yeah?"

She let out a shaky breath, but failed to open her eyes. "For now." She whispered.

"What's wrong with your eyes?" He asked her, hoping to get her mind off of the pain. He glanced back at the cloth that was now soaked with her blood, not sure where he had got it from exactly, but glad he had nonetheless.

"They did something." She murmured, words beginning to slur. He could hear her breathing becoming shallower, even as the stubborn side of her carried on to finished explaining what she had been saying. "Hurts to see."

"Yeah, looked like it." Deeks replied distractedly as Callen's anxious voice asked him where they were through the earpiece. Telling him as best as he could after another glance around for directions, he inhaled deeply. "Kensi?" He asked hesitantly before freeing one hand to shake her gently. "Kensi!"

When she failed to reply, he nervously placed a hand at her throat, glad to feel a pulse even if it was rather weak. He knew that the ambulance would take a bit longer to get to where they were, but he wasn't sure how much blood he could keep inside of her if they didn't get there soon.

* * *

**_Sorry for the wait once again. I got this finished last night by FF.n wasn't working so I couldn't post it. Thank you all to who read, faved and alerted this fic! More thanks to Sair J, Cowboy's Girl, Madil93, and evershort for the reviews. I know you guys always review every chapter, and for that I am so grateful! I hope to post the next chapter sooner than last time, lol. Please R&R :D_**


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